In all things, be thou thankful

Oluwatosin Alalade

3 Nov 2017

A good place to start this discourse is to give some thought to the significance of thanksgiving. Every human creature has a moral duty of gratitude, the duty to express appreciation for favor received, for undeserved gift or honor bestowed, for superior service rendered by others, for unmerited grace from God, and even for what human beings or the world around us may consider to be a setback in our journey of life.

A favor, by definition, is a benefit that is bestowed without a corresponding service on the part of the recipient. It is an unusual act of kindness which is not extended in exchange for an immediate return. For this reason, moralists and spiritualists of different faiths suggest that gratitude is due to the moral agent who extended the favor in the first place.

As an act of kindness, favor may be extended in various ways and by various means. It may come in the form of a gift to the needy, not because the recipient has a right to it, but because the giver is inclined to give.

We receive such acts of kindness on a daily basis from the ultimate gift giver, the Almighty God. It is what we understand as grace, an unmerited favor. Notice the difference. The favor we receive from human beings like us may be based on the individual’s evaluation of our standing. It may be an expression of approval of our conduct. However, the grace of God is bestowed on human beings despite their inadequacies.

Finally, an unanticipated outstanding service deserves a heart of gratitude. Sometimes, and in some climes, the expression of gratitude is so ingrained in the culture that any positive act of service is taken as a favor and as an object of gratitude or appreciation. Thus, a professional hair dresser or barber may render a regular service for which he or she is paid what is due. But he or she not only gets a tip for the job, but also a thank you from the customer.

On what ground do we have a moral duty of gratitude, appreciation, or thanksgiving? What creates the duty? What is the basis of the obligation? Why do we need to offer thanks for a kind act? This question is not out of place. Expression of thanks is not inborn. That is why we teach our toddlers to say, “thank you” to those who favor them with gifts.

From our faith-based understandings of life and its vicissitude, we thank our benefactors because it is divinely ordained. Every religion preaches the importance of gratitude. In the Christian faith, the story of the ten lepers whom Christ healed is a divine lesson on the importance of gratitude.

After the ten lepers approached him with their passionate plea for healing, Jesus instructed them to show their skins to the clergy. They did. However, out of the ten, only one, a foreigner, returned to offer thanks to his healer. To which Jesus made his famous remark: ten were cleansed; where are the remaining nine? If God commands thanksgiving as a practice, then, we must obey the command.

But there is more to the matter of thanksgiving than God’s command. After all, it stands to reason that God commands it because it is good to give thanks. But what makes it good in the first place? Thanksgiving is a moral duty, not simply because it is a commandment of God but because it is right and proper to give thanks. The question is “what makes it proper?”

In our various traditional value systems, gratitude and thanksgiving feature prominently. There is no equivocation in the Yoruba insistence that “bi a ba se ni lore, ope laa du” (gratitude or thankfulness is a requirement when a favor is received). The statement expressed here does not appear to have a religious connotation. Thanksgiving for kindness is simply understood as good-in-itself.

For those who would seek a firmer grounding, however, our sages have a deeper insight. They provide a useful analogy to describe a case of unappreciated kindness. It is considered not too dissimilar to a situation of an armed robber who attacked a person on the highway, robbing him of all his belongings. In other words, an ungrateful person might as well be an armed robber.

While the analogy depicts ingratitude as armed robbery, an evil act, it does not really tell us what makes gratitude good. If ingratitude is bad because it is analogous to armed robbery, what makes gratitude good?

We must commend the Yoruba for their pragmatic moral reasoning. For in their understanding of human life and human affairs, whatever is attributed to the divine also has a worldly character. So, it is with the virtue of thankfulness or gratitude. Thankfulness is good for its benefits. if we are thankful for a favor received, we stand a good chance of receiving more favor in the future. Bi a ba dupe ore ana, a tun ri omiran gba. Or eni yin ni yin ni, keni se omiran. Be appreciative of favor received so that the one so praised may be motivated to do more.

Now, so much for the motivation to thankfulness because of favor received. But people of faith also know that the command of God regarding gratitude does not relate to just occasions when we are the recipients of benefits.

Even in our moment of anguish and sadness, when it appears that God has not been good to us, or that the fortunes of life have passed us by, we are enjoined to be grateful. All Abrahamic faiths, including Islam and Judaism, share this belief in the importance of gratitude despite life’s trials and challenges. After all, God knows best.

“In all things, be ye thankful” is the religious injunction. Why? Part of the reason has to do with the acknowledged shallowness of our human understanding vis-à-vis God’s wisdom. Sometimes, we try very hard impersonating God and pretending that we are wiser than the creator. At such times, we may be confident that we know the future and it is all shining brightly. Our aim is to capture it.

But the divine’s plan for our life may conflict with our human understanding. Therefore, when we encounter an unexpected event, and our human understanding jumps in, it is human nature to tend to see the worst. But given the depth of his wisdom and his beneficence, it must be that God sees a different and positive ultimate outcome.

At such moments, we are better served by putting our hands in God’s hand, thanking him for his unfailing love, and focusing on the unseen blessings even amidst the uncertainties of life that have just appeared to set us back. This was the lesson of Job who went from riches to rags and back up to riches such that his end was by far better than his beginning.

“When upon life’s billows you are tempest-tossed/ When you are discouraged, thinking all is lost/ Count your many blessings/ Name them one by one/ And it will surprise you what the Lord has done/ Count your blessings/ Name them one by one. Count your blessings/ See what God hath done/ Count your blessings/ Name them one by one. Count your many blessings/ See what God hath done.”

Indeed, there is reason to be thankful, despite our limited understanding of what may appear as a cruel hand of fate. Our creator knows best.